Minor Leaguer Hits Ball So Hard It Does Something Usually Only Seen In Cartoons
A minor-league ballplayer hit a baseball so hard that it literally punched a hole in the outfield wall.
Highly-touted Blue Jays prospect Gabriel Moreno, playing for the Buffalo Bisons, came up to bat in the 9th and hit what was initially ruled a home run. It took a few moments for the umps to realize the ball didn’t sail over the wall.
It stuck in it:
Gabriel Moreno doubles INTO the wall!
The top @BlueJays prospect rips one 111 mph off the bat for the @BuffaloBisons, and the ball finds a home in the padding. pic.twitter.com/f4FWcQN1kb— MLB Pipeline (@MLBPipeline) August 18, 2022
“I was thinking that’s a homer because that’s what the umpire said first so I kept running,” Moreno told The Buffalo News. “But when I looked, the left fielder is pointing and the ball is in the wall. I was just thinking, ‘Wow.’ I couldn’t believe it.”
It was ultimately ruled a double.
MLB.com said balls do, from time to time, get stuck in the walls of minor-league parks, but they’re usually wedged between padding or stuck in a chain-link fence. This play was different because it actually broke through the padding on the wall itself.
Moreno, a catcher, is the top prospect in the Toronto system. Earlier this year, the 22-year-old was ranked No. 5 in all of baseball by Baseball America. He is currently ranked 7th in MLB.com’s listings.
Cool as Wednesday night’s moment was, it didn’t help the cause: Buffalo lost to the Lehigh Valley IronPigs by a score of 15-4.
This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.